May 6, 2012
by Melissa
2 Comments

The best French macarons in France?

French Macarons!

Before we ever set foot in Paris, I knew that we would be headed to two famous French pastry shops, Pierre Hermé and Ladurée, to sample French macarons. Just in case you haven’t tried a French macaron yet, they are a meringue based confection (pretty much a cookie) customarily made with almond flour, usually found as two pieces sandwiched together with a flavored buttercream or ganache.

I tried my first macarons in the U.S. a few years ago and it’s hard to resist trying them whenever I go to a new bakery or pastry shop that carries them. However, U.S. made macarons are rumored to be inferior to the ones actually made in France. And now that I’ve tried the French ones, I can safely say that this rumor is true. The French ones really are better. They’re better looking and better tasting. And talking about them makes me want to jump on the next plane to Paris for a few more of them.

While were in Paris, we were lucky enough to visit the Pierre Hermé shop in the 15th Arrondissement on four or five occasions as it was located just a few metro stops away from our hotel. The croissants and pain au chocolat from Pierre Hermé are fantastic and I tried my very first Canelé there as well – but the real reason any visitor to Paris (or London on Tokyo, since there are shops in those cities) needs to visit Pierre Hermé is to try a macaron. Or maybe to try 4, 6 or 8 macarons. I’ve seen pictures of the lines at some of the Pierre Hermé shops snaking out the door and down the street, but we were fortunate enough to never have to wait in line for more than a few minutes. But I would gladly stand in line in the street for these macarons.

We did visit Ladurée (and I’ve got pictures of those macarons to share later) but in my opinion, the Pierre Hermé macarons are better. The Ladurée ones are wonderful and way better than any you’ll find that were made in the U.S., but the Pierre Hermé macarons were just a little bit superior. And just a little bit more perfect looking.

We bought macarons on two separate visits and tried a total of five different flavors: chocolate, salted butter caramel, chocolate and caramel, milk chocolate with passion fruit and vanilla. Which one was my favorite? Vanilla. It was the most full of vanilla flavor thing I think I’ve ever eaten. The salted butter caramel was a very close second though.

Just to taunt you, here are more pictures of what I think might be the best French macarons in France.

Pierre Hermé Storefront in the 15th Arrondissement

Pierre Hermé Sign

Chocolate macaron: Infiniment Chocolat Porcelana

Vanilla Macaron: Infinement Vanille

Salted Butter Caramel Macaron: Infiniment Caramel

Milk Chocolate and Passion Fruit Macaron - Mogador

Another Shot of the Salted Butter Caramel Macaron

April 18, 2012
by Melissa
4 Comments

Paris, je t’aime.

Paris in the spring.

I’ve only been back from our vacation in Paris for a couple of days, so I haven’t yet found the opportunity to edit more than a couple of the hundreds and hundreds of photos I took in the week that we were there. I hope to find a little time each night for the next week to edit and post them. And when I do, several blog posts will follow. There will be lots of talk about croissants and macarons and other French food (I took notes for literally every meal we ate on my iPhone) as well as lots of pictures of Paris itself.

Until then, here’s a quick summary of a few things I don’t wish to forget.

Days we were in Paris: 7

Our bedtime on the day we arrived: 5:30 PM, Paris time

Orders of steak frites consumed: 1

People in The Louvre when we were there: 1,000,000 (or so it seemed)

Favorite part of the city that we visited: Montmartre, excluding the streets with all of the tacky souvenir shops

Slices of French bread consumed between my husband and I: 50+

Steps climbed to reach the top of the Sacre Coeur: 300 (and that doesn’t include the steps just to get to the Sacre Coeur)

Cheese courses I attempted to discreetly skip because I have no taste in cheese: 2

Number of times the waiter called me out for skipping the cheese course: 1

My husband’s breakfast each morning: pain au chocolat

Creperies visited: 1

Visits to Pierre Hermé for pastries or macarons: 5

Metro rides we took: at least 50

Time we waited to get to the top of the Eiffel Tower: 30 minutes (we went late at night)

People who exited the Eiffel Tower after us: 0 (other than the staff)

New to me foods: cannelle, clafoutis, cream of cauliflower soup, braised fennel, duck rillettes and skate

Croissants or croissant-type items consumed between the two of us: approximately 14

Coffee of choice in France: café crème, even though I don’t usually drink hot beverage

Days we went to the Champ de Mars to stare at the Eiffel Tower: 4

Famous bakeries located adjacent to stops on the Metro line from our hotel: Poilâne and Pierre Hermé

Number of times I caved and went to Starbucks for a beverage: 1 (and we only went because there was a bathroom nearby)

Number of times we ate escargot: 1

Orla Kiely scarves purchased for myself at Uniqlo: 2

Metro station with the most steps to climb to reach ground level: Abesses in Montmartre

Number of times I accidentally poured water into my wine glass instead of waiting for the server to do it: 1

Macarons consumed between my husband and I: 15

Buildings/structures we went to the top of during the trip: Eiffel Tower, Arc de Triomphe and Sacre Coeur (we skipped Notre Dame as the line was intensely long)

Jambon sandwiches consumed between my husband and I: 3

Stores I wanted to go to that were open in Paris on a Sunday: 1

I have much more to tell, but that will have to wait until I have more pictures ready!

March 7, 2012
by Melissa
0 comments

The mocha of my dreams.

Blue Bottle Coffee

This is another one of those honeymoon posts I started last year and never got around to posting. Since my first wedding anniversary is very rapidly approaching and my husband and I are taking an anniversary vacation next month, it’s time to get these posts out of the queue.

I love coffee. Scratch that. I love espresso. I don’t actually drink regular coffee. Ever. And when I drink espresso, it’s almost always in an iced latte form. I don’t usually like hot drinks.

But when we were in San Francisco last spring and strolled through the Ferry Building Marketplace in search of morning caffeine, I was drawn to a mocha from Blue Bottle Coffee. I wanted to try their coffee as it was very well regarded. And we had just been on a tour at the Tcho chocolate factory, where they told us about their drinking chocolate and mentioned that it was used by Blue Bottle Coffee.

Mocha from Blue Bottle Coffee

So, I ordered a mocha. And it was the best warm coffee drink I’ve ever had. Full of dark chocolate flavor without being cloyingly sweet, it was amazing. I hope to make it back to San Francisco someday and when I do, I’ll definitely need another one of these mochas. If you ever find yourself wandering around the Ferry Building in need of a warm drink or a pick me up, go order one of these!

This winter, I’ve found myself ordering mochas when we’re out of town and I’m in need of coffee, but they all pale in comparison to this one. I could order some Tcho drinking chocolate and a pound of Blue Bottle espresso beans and try to recreate it at home, but I doubt it would taste as wonderful as this one did.

Mmmmmmocha.

February 8, 2012
by Melissa
0 comments

Craving cured.

February 7, 2012 - I was craving cornbread.

Blueberry Cornbread

For several days this week, I found myself craving cornbread. I’m not sure where the craving came from, but I suspect it came from the menu at a restaurant we ate at last weekend. The restaurant, Maya, is here in Charlottesville and they offer a long list of sides that come with each entrée. I didn’t choose cornbread that night for dinner, but seeing it listed must have made me want it anyway.

I like my cornbread sweet and usually don’t make it as sweet as I want it. As a result, I think I use a different recipe every single time I bake it. This time I used a Mark Bittman recipe that I found online. Bittman’s recipes usually turn out great for me and the recipe touted itself as “easy and forgiving,” which is exactly what I was after for weeknight baking. The recipe also called for a flexible amount of sugar, so I figured that gave me a little wiggle room for making it extra sweet.

And just to mix things up, I threw in some frozen blueberries. It sounds kind of weird, but I had tried blueberry cornbread before, so I knew it was a good combo. Plus I have a LOT of frozen blueberries to go through in the next handful of months.

For the blueberries, I used a trick I learned from a Martha Stewart blueberry muffins recipe. Toss the blueberries in a little bit of flour before adding them to the batter. When you do this, the blueberries don’t sink to the bottom!

The original recipe called for 1/4 to 1/2 cup of sugar. I used the 1/4 cup of sugar and then added a 1/3 cup of honey. If you don’t like your cornbread as sweet as I do, use just a 1/4 cup of sugar.

Cornbread!

Blueberry Cornbread

Recipe slightly adapted from a NY Times Recipe of the Day by Mark Bittman

Ingredients

4 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 1/2 cups yellow cornmeal
1/2 cup unbleached all-purpose flour, plus 1 tablespoon for blueberries
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup honey
2 eggs
1 1/4 cups milk, more if needed
1 cup fresh or frozen blueberries

Directions

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Put butter in an 8-inch square baking pan. Place pan in oven.
Combine all dry ingredients in a bowl. Mix honey and eggs into milk, then stir this mixture into dry ingredients, combining with a few swift strokes. If mixture seems dry, add another tablespoon or two of milk.
In a small bowl, toss blueberries with one tablespoon flour (this keeps them from sinking to the bottom of the batter while baking). Gently fold blueberries into cornbread batter.
When butter in pan has melted and the oven is hot, remove pan from oven, pour batter into it and smooth out top. Return pan to oven.
Bake about 30 minutes, until top is lightly browned and sides have pulled away from pan; a toothpick inserted into center will come out clean. Serve warm.

February 6, 2012
by Melissa
0 comments

I no longer fail at making bread pudding.

Bread Pudding with Bourbon Sauce

It’s only 37 days into 2012 and I’ve already successfully cooked several things I had never cooked before and as of yesterday, I finally made a decent batch of bread pudding. In fact, this batch of bread pudding is so decent, that I think it’s possibly the best bread pudding I’ve ever eaten. It may spoil me for all future bread puddings in restaurants.

I’ve previously made bread pudding at least a couple of times and although it was usually edible, it wasn’t great. I think I was trying too hard and adding too many things to my bread pudding. I should have kept it simple. Like the bread pudding currently in my refrigerator.

Boozy Bread Pudding

After my mediocre attempts a couple of years ago, I kind of gave up on ever making bread pudding again. Then my friend Alison recommended a bread pudding with bourbon sauce recipe from Simply Recipes. She liked it enough that she’s made it more than once, so I thought this recipe might be worth a shot.

Fast forward about a month and I finally made the Simply Recipes version. And it is AMAZING. So good that I want to eat it slowly and enjoy every bite. It’s the kind of dessert that makes me yell how good it is while I’m eating it. I’ve already declared it the very best dessert I’ve made in a really long time. I’ve also already decided that I love it so much that I want to make another batch of it as soon as this batch is gone. I think my husband agrees with me on all counts.

Bread Puddings

I’m not going to post the recipe here as I really didn’t do much altering of the Simply Recipes recipe. You should make it as it is.

My notes about my slight changes to the recipe, should you care to take them into consideration:

I didn’t have quite enough bourbon on hand to make the sauce AND soak the raisins, so I soaked the raisins in a bit of amaretto instead. Why amaretto? Because I love cooking with it. No real reason other than that. My second substitute choice probably would have been rum.
In the recipe, it’s mentioned that the bread pudding could be made in individual ramekins instead of the 9×13 baking dish. I went with the individual ramekins. My guess was that the individual bread puddings would be less mushy. I was correct and I’ll probably never bake bread pudding in a big pan again.
The bourbon sauce calls for 1 cup of bourbon. The recipe warns that the sauce is very, very boozy and that the amount of bourbon used can be reduced. I only had a 1/2 cup of bourbon in the house (and it was Sunday, so I couldn’t buy more). So I used the 1/2 cup I had and in my opinion, it was still a bit too much bourbon. Next time I’ll probably use just a 1/4 cup of it.
Although these were amazing just out of the oven, the leftovers are still pretty phenomenal. Just lightly warm the bread pudding in the microwave.
Finally, if you don’t like bourbon or don’t like sauce (or don’t want to get sauced on the sauce), these taste just fine with no sauce at all. Or you could substitute some sort of caramel or toffee sauce. Or top it with vanilla ice cream. I think a drizzle of maple syrup would be pretty fantastic, too. Then it would essentially taste like French Toast. And there’s nothing wrong with that!

The Boastful Baker

because every cook praises her own broth

Paris, je t’aime.

The mocha of my dreams.

Craving cured.

Blueberry Cornbread

Ingredients

Directions

I no longer fail at making bread pudding.